3 AM
by Kakawot
Summary: Donatello wants to be called a bonehead, and Raphael obliges. 3 AM phone calls are still the best. Short almost bare-dialogue story.


**A/N: **This conversation-bunny bit my ankle and wouldn't let go. Your guess is as good as mine as to where Donatello is at, but hopefully this conversation will put a smile on your face.

(Bear in mind English isn't my mother language, so please notify me of any grammar or spelling mistakes. Spellcheck said "wow you're awesome have my babies", but you know how reliable those are.)

* * *

The shrill cell phone noise was not a welcome wake-up call, and it took Raphael a while to locate the tiny thing. When his sleep-fuddled hands finally grabbed hold of it he glanced at the screen, groaned, and took the call.

"You got a lot of guts to call me at 3 am, Donnie."

"Tell me I'm a bonehead", came the quiet request.

"Fine. Don, you're a bonehead," said Raphael deadpan. "You're the biggest damn bonehead this side of the millennium. If you look up boneheadism, your portrait is right there, next to Mikey's."

"That was pretty lame. Did the Shredder steal your wit or something?"

"Bro, it's 3 am. I reserve all my good insults for times when people don't command me to insult them."

"Alright, I'll give you that. I just needed to hear from you I'm a bonehead for being in this inspiring place, meeting all kinds of interesting and incredibly smart people, and all I can think about is how I miss Leo's nagging and the sewer-stench."

"I find that very hard to believe, somehow. Actually, I wish we could've traded places so you could go listen to Leo whine about… something. I tuned it out. I think it was about how I lacked discipline."

"As usual."

Noted Donatello, and Raphael echoed it back.

"As usual."

Donatello kept quiet, so Raphael woke up his conversation skills and persuaded them to actually take part in this conversation.

"So is it going as you hoped?"

"It's going as I feared. Well, at least they stopped looking at me like they wanted to dissect me on the spot and started taking me seriously. So I guess that's a plus. It's just, there are surprisingly few open-minded people."

"Welcome to my world."

"Why thank you. It's a lovely world, apart from the stubbornness and the, oh, I know, utter disregard for safety of yourself and others in favor of storming headfirst into frays."

"I'll just take that as a compliment so I won't have to list your shortcomings. My brain is too asleep for that."

"Your brain is asleep all the time. No, wait, that's Mikey."

"Seems like you're still asleep as well, with your lame insults."

Donatello answered that remark with a vague "yeah…" and it was once again up to Raphael to further the conversation. And he had a perfect conversation piece.

"Why didn't you let us join?"

It was almost an accusation. Raphael had felt left behind when Donatello announced that he'd go to the convention alone. The red-banded turtle knew he'd be bored out of his mind, but still, it was his brother who was throwing himself into the dangerous outside world, with no one at his back (or his side).

"Because this is something that I have to do by myself. I thought you of all people'd understand. I have to prove something to myself, even though I'm not sure what exactly that is. I just know I don't want Leo breathing down my shell, telling me to rest, and certainly no Mikey to bounce in unannounced and knock something over. I just… need this."

Well, it wasn't a rational explanation like he'd expected, but still, he understood this need on some level.

"I guess... Just, next time, take at least one of us with you. I don't like not being there to have your back."

"Take it easy Raph, there's no Foot around to de-shell me. Worst they could do to me would be throwing their laptops at me. Remember, I'm at the 'nerd-convention', according to Mikey. Laptops are their babies, so no laptop-throwing going on here."

"Nerd rage is famous for a reason. I remember messing something up about Star Trek Wars or something-"

"It's Star Trek OR Star Wars, not both."

"My point exactly. You fly into nerd rage."

"It's not nerd rage. It's merely correcting the uneducated in the matters of science fiction shows, uneducated being you and your boneheadedness."

"I thought you wanted to be the bonehead in this convo. Or I could call you some other stuff as well, because it's still three in the damn morning, and I'm talking to you out of the goodness of my heart instead of hanging up on you and going back to sleep in my comfy, comfy hammock."

That got him a laugh.

"The goodness of your heart is an endless well, and sometimes we all need a piece."

"It's too early slash late in the night slash morning to be cryptic. Small words."

"Just… thanks for calling me a bonehead, Raph. I'll let you get back to sleep now."

"You damn well better let me."

Raphael let a few seconds of silence dangle before finishing:

"And hey, anytime, bro."

Before Donatello could reply he hung up and let the shell-cell rest on his plastron. Within minutes his snores once again reverberated throughout the Lair.

It took Donatello a whole lot longer to go back to sleep, but finally he drifted off as well, with a small smile still gracing his face.


End file.
